From the Editor's Desk:
Neighborhood short Cirque
December 08, 2001
I can't tell you how mad it makes me that a pre-emptive strike by
a neighborhood association has deprived the rest of us of the
chance to see some very exciting, original, high art. The highest
of arts, in fact. I can't tell you, but I can try.
A secondary problem, gentle readers, is
that the neighborhood association is my own. As a dues-paying
member of the Linda Vista-Annandale Association, which does much
good in the form of beautification projects and little reminders
to roll those trash bins in from the curb, I suppose I'm all het
up at myself here.
And I'm not even as opposed as the rest
of society says I should be to the supposed sin of NIMBYism. If I
wanted a skyscraper in my back yard, I'd move to Houston.
But I'll tell you what I do want in
appropriate doses at least a short bike ride from my back yard,
and that's beauty and fun and brilliant entertainment for the
whole family.
That is precisely what was being proposed
by Cirque du Soleil. The world-traveling dancers and acrobats from
Quebec, which these days perform the show "Dralion,"
proposed to pitch their Big Top in Brookside Park south of the
Rose Bowl for most of March and some of April.
They had proposed such for years, in
fact, but logistical problems got in the way. The Arroyo Seco fits
perfectly as a location for Cirque du Soleil: a wild area for
ambience surrounded by the city for patrons, just like the great
Santa Monica beach location of a few years back.
That's when we took my parents-in-law,
who are in their 80s, and our daughter, who was 8, to see the
cirque's "Quidam."
I suppose I was ready for it to be a
really good show. But at the circus, you expect at best nice
craft, not art of the most extraordinary level. And yet art --
entrancing music, an oblique but spiritually deep plot, gorgeous
costumes and the oddest, most athletic tumblers and dancers and
high-wire walkers I'd ever seen -- was what we got.
From 8 to 85, we had never known anything
like it. After two hours of magic, we all came out raving. My hep
father-in-law went right out and bought the CD, to boot.
To be able to see Cirque du Soleil right
here in the San Gabriel Valley was the chance of a lifetime. The
City Council was set to approve it -- this being the kind of
animal act-less circus of which our elected leaders approve. But
before it even got the chance, the cirque itself pulled out after
hearing that the LVAA would object, citing noise and traffic
concerns.
"We like it to be a happy
time," Cirque du Soleil told the city manager's office.
"If there's any kind of animosity ... it's just not for
us."
Noise? City tests showed that the lovely
ambient music the cirque would have played in the middle of the
arroyo couldn't be heard from the arroyo's edges, where people
live.
Traffic? We're talking 2,500 seats a
night, which is what, 1,000 cars? That's what a big picnic in
Brookside draws. And this in a neighborhood that is home to the
Rose Bowl, with its 90,000-plus seats. With its 50,000 UCLA fans
who park on the golf course and light charcoal bonfires on the
fairways, its Rolling Stones concerts and World Cup matches. Not
that I object to the Rose Bowl and its crowds. But I do realize,
as I did when I moved there, that a world-class stadium has a
certain impact on a neighborhood.
The Cirque du Soleil would have had about
as much impact on our neighborhood as an AYSO tournament, and less
impact than the fund-raising runs and swap meets that draw
visitors most every weekend. It would have made people happy. And,
get this, it would have netted Pasadena about $335,000.
It's more than embarrassing to me, this
successful effort to drive the circus from my town. It's an
outrage. And I don't believe that anything like most of my
neighbors had a problem with the Big Top. I'd say it's more like a
dozen or so, whereas thousands would welcome it. So I feel like
mounting a campaign to tell the Cirque du Soleil -- which will
indeed be welcomed somewhere in Southern California next March
--the truth, and invite it to reconsider Pasadena, where we'd love
to have it. If you'd like to join me, please drop a line.
-- Larry Wilson is editor of the Pasadena
Star-News. Write him at larry.wilson@sgvn.com